Thoughts, Uncertainties and Grieving Through Adoption

I've been reading a lot lately.  So many adoption books about what to expect when you come home with a new child, the differences between raising an adopted child vs. a biological child, the issues that surround an orphans life...

We are in the thick of the adoption process now.  I have filled out more paperwork than when we purchased our first home.  We've been humbled to tears on more than one occasion, in fact, I can't even count all the different ways the Lord has graciously worked through His people on our behalf and on the behalf of our daughter who is 6,000 miles away, as we continuously see the Lord working through His people to help us bring our little girl home.

But with the process comes a sort of sobering realization. 

Our life as we know it is going to change forever.  I know this is a wonderful thing.  But it is so scary at the same time. 

We don't know how the Lord is going to provide all that we need to bring our daughter home, we don't know how we are going to get Areyna to eat anything in Uganda, we don't know how the kids are going to behave while we spend hours finalizing documents and court hearings, we don't know how to put our lives on hold here in America for 6 weeks, or however long this process is going to take, while we pack up our family to live in a foreign land and culture, we don't know if our kids might get sick because we can't for the life of us get them to stop sucking their thumbs, and all the germs and bacteria in Uganda that their little bodies are not used to, we don't know how our little girl is going to react as we leave all that she knows behind...

Most of these uncertainties I have expected would arise.  I knew these issues would come up, but they are actually becoming a reality now.  It's all happening so quickly...

There is, though, one thing, in reading all these books, that I hadn't even thought about.

Grieving.

Did you know that with the adoption process comes times of grieving?  I sure didn't.  I hadn't even really thought about it until now.

But really, think about it.  Our little girl came from a birth mommy and daddy.  I wonder if our little girl's birth mom knows that someone, a stranger, wants to adopt her little girl yet.  Sure, she relinquished her daughter to this orphanage, but she knows exactly where her little girl is.  Now, some Americans want to come over and take her away.  I can't imagine how that must feel.  And that's the grieving you feel for the birth mom. 

This isn't even to mention the grieving through loss you will experience with your adopted child.  She is about to lose all that she knows, even when what you have to offer is SO much better.  She hasn't come to that realization yet.  All she knows is that she is going to a place she doesn't know, with people she doesn't know, playing with toys and kids she doesn't know and eating food she isn't familiar with.

So, yes...yes there is grieving, a lot of grieving...involved in this process.

We are uncertain about a lot of things, but like our Pastor preached about this past weekend, the Lord knows how it is all going to play out.  He knows what He has called us to do and we just need to hang on tight, because He is about to put on a show of how miraculous He truly is!